How Do You Balance Life and Career?

On May 6, 2015, two foam boards with the question, “How do you balance life and career?” were mounted on easels at the Career-Life Balance Initiative Launch, an event open to the entire University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC) community. People came to learn about the Career-Life Balance Initiative at UMBC, a new initiative on campus. Attendees were provided with a colored post-it specific to the following categories: blue (administrative members), green (faculty), orange (undergraduate students), pink (staff), and yellow (graduate students). Each person had the opportunity to place his/her post-it on the foam boards, describing how he/she individually balances life and career responsibilities. As an open-ended question, it brought insight to the various strategies people utilize for achieving career-life balance.

 

Career-Life17

Career-Life Balance Initiative Foam Board.

Attendees were given the opportunity to answer the question, “How do you balance life and career?” Post-it color key: Administrative Members (Blue Post-Its), Faculty (Green Post-Its), Graduate Students (Yellow Post-Its), Undergraduate Students (Orange Post-Its), and Staff (Pink Post-Its)

 

From the post-its that were gathered, there was a wide variety of career-life balance strategies that were used. Below is a list of methods the UMBC community has used for balancing life and career responsibilities. Feel free to use the strategies below if you find them useful!

 

Example Career-Life Balance Strategies Utilized by the UMBC Community:

  • Exercising
  • Having a good boss
  • Having a massage
  • Keeping work tasks at work and home tasks at home
  • Reserving a day out of the week to relax
  • Spending time with family and friends
  • Taking a nap
  • Taking a vacation
  • Using the Google calendar to organize and plan events
  • Waking up super early